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She sighed.
“Want to talk about it?” I asked her.
“Talk about what?” Her voice was thick with sleep.
“Your dream. Sounded like you might have been having a bad one. You can share. I’ll listen.”
“Yeah, it was a bad one,” she admitted but said nothing more.
I looked down at my watch and saw it was well after seven. We had been sleeping for two hours.
“Wow, we’ve been out for quite a while.”
“Yeah, I guess so,” was all she said. Mia’s voice sounded detached. Like she was barely there, only going through the motions.
“I’m an excellent listener,” I reminded her. That earned me a laugh. “I am. You don’t believe me, then try me.”
“Oh, Terry. It’s not that I don’t think you’re a good listener. That’s not why I don’t want to share too much. It’s just that I don’t want you to see me differently once you know all that has happened to me. I don’t want you to pity me or treat me differently. I want us to still be the us we were before Chad came back into the picture.” She spat his name with such disgust that it made me tighten my fist at my side. I didn’t want her to see how badly I truly hated him. I didn’t want her to think I would go out and find the bastard so I could beat him to a pulp, though that’s what I desperately wanted to do.
“I hate what you went through, and I wonder if it’s worse than my imagination. But I’m not looking at you with pity. I think you’re so incredibly strong for all you’ve accomplished in spite of Chad.” I, too, spat his name. I hated that he was back in her life. I hated that he had put his hands on her and that she was now living in fear. “But I promise, I’m here to protect you. You don’t have to go through this alone anymore. I want to be here for you. I want to help you.”
“I never went through it alone,” she admitted to me. “I had Bryce. He had some bad shit happen to him too, and we helped each other cope.”
I nodded. “Well, I’m glad you had him to help you cope then. But now you have me. Let me help you cope too. Let me help you get through this.”
“I will,” she said. We were quiet for a moment, and then she continued. “That is where the marks on my body came from. Those are old cigarette burns and the long one is where he cut me with a knife the last time we were together. Some scars just don’t heal.” Her eyes left mine and she shuddered.
I felt sick to my stomach thinking about the things she had told me. Knowing that he had hurt her and how frightened she must have been.
“What were you dreaming about?” I asked.
“I was dreaming about the last time he had me. When he did all of this.” She gestured to where the marks were underneath her clothes.
I swallowed, choking back emotion.
“Don’t,” she told me. “Don’t pity me. I made it through. I survived. I just have to do it one more time.”
“You will. If I have any say in it.”
She leaned up and kissed my cheek. “I think you might have some, but Catherine has plans. So you better fall in line behind her.”
We both laughed and I nodded in agreement.
“I have an idea,” I told her. “It’s late and you need to eat. Let’s say I order out some Thai food and we eat it in my tub.”
“You want to take a bath while eating dinner?” she asked me, an amused grin playing on her lips.
“Yeah, if I only fill the tub halfway, we can eat and not get the food wet.”
“Why, Terry, I had no idea you enjoyed baths so much,” she said, teasing me.
Less than an hour later, we were waist-deep in my tub, enjoying some Thai food. I had researched how to create a nice, relaxing bath: what scents to use to help calm her, the temperature of the water. I felt a little like an ass for how I came about this knowledge. But Mia knew that I wasn’t a saint once I left her.
We both had pasts, hers was just a little darker than mine.
“So how many women have enjoyed baths like this?” Mia waited until we were well into our Thai food to ask this question. Up until now, the only noises in the room had been the soft music playing and moans of Mia enjoying the food. I was wishing the water came up just a little higher because if she kept moaning like that, I was going to have a big problem.
“Um, I don’t know,” I admitted. And it was the truth. I had no idea how many women I had done this with. It kind of became a signature move of mine, though I’d never used it when they were in such a vulnerable state as Mia was.
